AUSTIN, Texas (Reuters) - An inspiring escape-from-poverty story helped Texas Democrat Wendy Davis rise to political prominence, but suspicions that she embellished parts of her biography could hurt her campaign for governor. Davis's campaign is facing its first test in crisis management after the Dallas Morning News in the past week published reports questioning details of how Davis, a state senator, went from teenage mother in a Texas trailer park to...

By Jon Herskovitz AUSTIN, Texas, Jan 28 (Reuters) - The daughters of Texas gubernatorial candidate Wendy Davis rallied to her defense against accusations that their mother embellished her biography, saying in open letters released on Tuesday they wanted to "set the record straight. " Davis, a Democrat, is trying to recover from a major setback after the Dallas Morning News earlier this month questioned details about the inspiring life story at...

By Jon Herskovitz AUSTIN, Texas, Jan 28 (Reuters) - The daughters of Texas gubernatorial candidate Wendy Davis rallied to her defense against accusations that their mother embellished her biography, saying in open letters released on Tuesday they wanted to "set the record straight. " Davis, a Democrat, is trying to recover from a major setback after the Dallas Morning News earlier this month questioned details about the inspiring life story at...

AUSTIN, Texas (Reuters) - An inspiring escape-from-poverty story helped Texas Democrat Wendy Davis rise to political prominence, but suspicions that she embellished parts of her biography could hurt her campaign for governor. Davis's campaign is facing its first test in crisis management after the Dallas Morning News in the past week published reports questioning details of how Davis, a state senator, went from teenage mother in a Texas trailer park to...

By going on strike and vanishing from the Capitol, Texas Democrats exposed themselves to ridicule Tuesday. Republicans slapped their faces on decks of playing cards and milk cartons as if they were missing children. Rep. Tom DeLay (R-Texas), the U.S. House majority leader, said the ploy--"to turn tail and run"--contradicts everything Texas stands for. It was, said Republican Gov. Rick Perry, a "childish prank." It was also a success. For a second day, 51 Democratic legislators...

By Jim Forsyth SAN ANTONIO, Texas, July 7 (Reuters) - Texas Governor Rick Perry, the nation's longest-serving governor and a failed contender for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination, planned to announce Monday whether he will seek re-election next year. Perry, 63, is best known nationally for his poor performance as a Republican candidate for the White House. During a debate in November 2011, he famously forgot the government departments ...

The Draft Farenthold for U.S. Senate Committee, formed by Texas Democrats, is urging Gov. Ann Richards to appoint Frances (Sissy) Farenthold to replace Lloyd Bentsen in the U.S. Senate when he is confirmed as treasury secretary. She would represent Texas until a special election is held, probably in May, says Martha Burk, a committee organizer. Farenthold, a lawyer who served in the Texas House from 1969 to 1973, was the first woman to have her name placed in nomination for vice president by a major party at the...

With Saturday's special U.S. Senate election certain to be viewed as a referendum on President Clinton, Texas Democrats are searching for signs of life in their candidate. There are few sure things in Texas politics, but the defeat of interim Sen. Bob Krueger is already being talked about in the past tense. On Thursday, Krueger's rival, Republican state Treasurer Kay Bailey Hutchison, was endorsed by Dallas billionaire Ross Perot and his United We Stand America...

(Corrects grammar in headline) * Democrats appeal the decision, seek vote * Only 2-1/2 hours left until special session ends June 25 (Reuters) - A Texas state Democrat who spoke for several hours on Tuesday in a bid to block a Republican drive for sweeping new abortion restrictions may be thwarted by Republicans who said she violated rules governing the stalling tactic. Texas State Senator Wendy Davis sought to derail a proposal ...

A federal judge in Texas ruled Thursday that the state's Republican Party must keep former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay on the ballot for re-election this November. With DeLay under indictment on campaign finance charges in Texas and under a cloud of scandal in Washington, Democrats had hoped to wrest the conservative district from him. But DeLay seemed to thwart those designs in April when he announced he would resign from Congress and move his official residence to...

AUSTIN, Texas (Reuters) - A Texas lawmaker who was a single mother at the age of 19 and is now a rising star of the state Democratic party was attempting to block a Republican drive for sweeping new abortion restrictions on Wednesday by speaking continuously for 12 hours. The filibuster by state Senator Wendy Davis, 50, could derail a proposal including a ban on abortion after 20 weeks of pregnancy. She must talk until midnight, when a 30-day special...

"When one of the brothers gets shot, everybody pulls out their guns." -Rep. Marvin Leath (D., Tex.), on the solidarity of Texas Democrats with House Speaker Jim Wright. "Being from Texas means never having to say you`re sorry." -Rep. Patricia Schroeder (D., Colo.), on how a more conciliatory tone might help Wright. "Hungarian glasnost has many faces, and one of them is the world passport which moved Hungary closer to Western Europe." -Hungarian...

A federal judge in Texas ruled Thursday that the state's Republican Party must keep former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay on the ballot for re-election this November. With DeLay under indictment on campaign finance charges in Texas and under a cloud of scandal in Washington, Democrats had hoped to wrest the conservative district from him. But DeLay seemed to thwart those designs in April when he announced he would resign from Congress and move his official residence to...

John C. White, a Texas sharecropper's son who became Democratic national chairman, died Friday in Georgetown University Hospital, where he had been under treatment for a heart ailment. He was 70. Mr. White had a successful career in state politics before he was drawn to Washington. Along the way, he won the friendship of powerful older Texas Democrats like Lyndon Johnson and Rep. Sam Rayburn, the longtime speaker of the house. Within the fractious state party, he gained a...

It was among the more audacious political moves in memory: The state of Texas, prodded by Rep. Tom DeLay, redrew its political map in 2003 to send more Republicans to Congress, the first such "mid-decade" redistricting in the modern era. The maneuver could hardly have been more successful. Six more Republicans were elected in 2004, making the Democrats' attempt to retake the House of Representatives this year all the more difficult. But there were negative consequences, too:...

The Republican campaign to draw new congressional districts in Texas has lasted so long and produced so many competing maps that the state might have to postpone primary elections, GOP officials said Friday. As a result, state voters might lose the chance to help pick a Democratic presidential candidate next spring. Republican leaders said that to wade through the map proposals, all of them generated by party members, they are considering postponing the primary election...

Justice Department lawyers concluded that the landmark Texas congressional redistricting plan spearheaded by Rep. Tom DeLay (R-Texas) violated the Voting Rights Act, but senior officials overruled them and approved the plan, according to a previously undisclosed memo. The memo, unanimously endorsed by six lawyers and two analysts in the department's voting section, said the redistricting plan illegally diluted black and Hispanic voting power in two congressional districts. It...

Victory has a hundred fathers, goes the saying, but defeat is an orphan. No one is rushing forward to accept blame for the drubbing Democrat Robert Krueger got in Saturday's election to fill the U.S. Senate seat vacated by Treasury Secretary Lloyd Bentsen. Bill Clinton's partisan critics, however, are eager to pin paternity on the president, who they say should learn some lessons from the gaudy 67-to-33 percent victory scored by Republican Kay Bailey Hutchison. The election, they insist, was a...